


bait and switch

by darlingofdots



Category: The Locked Tomb Trilogy | Gideon the Ninth Series - Tamsyn Muir
Genre: Camilla is not having any of her shit, Cunnilingus, F/F, Ianthe is a brat, Vaginal Fingering, handwaving a bunch of timeline issues
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-03-07
Updated: 2021-03-07
Packaged: 2021-03-13 16:27:15
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,084
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29903856
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/darlingofdots/pseuds/darlingofdots
Summary: Ianthe lurks in shadows. Camilla asserts dominance.
Relationships: Camilla Hect/Ianthe Tridentarius
Comments: 5
Kudos: 32
Collections: TLT Kink Meme





	bait and switch

“I bet you think you’re really clever,” drawls a voice from the shadowy corner of the dining hall.

Camilla does not jump, because she’s better than that, but her hand twitches towards the hilt of her rapier. She forces herself to turn slowly on her heel, keeping her weight even and steady, ready to spring into action. The Warden is waiting back in their rooms; she only crept downstairs because she’d been too busy nursing a bleeding forearm to restock the supply of non-perishables she is building up under the bed. If she gets herself killed now, his earlier annoyance at her recklessness would be entirely justified.

One of the shadows moves, and Camilla’s on it before it can yelp, twisting the figure’s arm behind its back and wrapping her uninjured forearm around its throat.

“Goodness,” the figure says, voice somewhat strained, “is this how Sixth soldiers seduce all those poor bastards on hold planets?”

It’s an insult that goes in one ear and out the other, but at least she finally recognises who it is she’s dealing with. There is no mistaking the tall, slender figure of Ianthe Tridentarius, even in the dark. Camilla does not loosen her grip. “What do you want,” she says, largely uninterested in the answer.

“Easy, easy,” says Ianthe, squirming a little. “What could I possibly want from _you_?”

That’s bait. “Answer the question, Tridentarius.”

“Nothing, I _swear_. I simply _happened_ to be down here when you passed on your very secret scholarly mission, which I have no doubt is _very_ important, and I thought I’d strike up a conversation.” She has the nerve to shrug, using only the one shoulder, and Camilla twists her other arm up higher until she yelps.

“If you think you can play games with me,” she says, “don’t.”

“Really.” There is a different tone to her voice now; something glutinous and sticky that tries to worm itself into Camilla’s brain. She shakes it off like a wet leaf. “Can you not think of anything fun the two of us could get up to? Your necromancer doesn’t need to know.”

Despite the fact that Ianthe can’t see her, Camilla rolls her eyes. It’s a cheap shot, and not even well-aimed. He is her adept, and she is his Hand, and if the Princess of Ida thinks the insinuation would offend her, she will be sorely disappointed.

“Or you could go and fetch him,” Ianthe continues, apparently forgetting that Camilla’s radius is pushing on her windpipe. “I’m sure he would come if you called, wouldn’t he? So well-trained.”

With the outside edge of her boot, Camilla finds the soft spot at the back of Ianthe’s knee and pushes down. The pale necromancer’s legs buckle under her and it’s the easiest thing in the world to step back, disrupt her centre of gravity, and guide Ianthe down to the dusty flagstones with her right arm still pinned under her. Camilla follows her down to crouch beside her with one knee on her chest to hold her in place. Her pulse is steady in her ears, but there on the ground beneath her, Ianthe is breathing hard.

“Well. I suppose it’s not _all_ exaggeration,” she wheezes, then coughs once and continues: “What they say about Sixth cavaliers.”

It is very obvious that she is trying to provoke Camilla; it’s not exactly subtle. Even in the washed-out darkness of the corridor, she can see the flush in her cheeks, the blown-out pupils. Camilla is not easily provoked. She is indeed too well-trained for that. But…

But, they’d been on the First for weeks with very little to show for it, and the duel against the Second left a dangerous cocktail of neurochemicals coursing in her veins, and, well, she _has_ taken some classes…

Keeping her expression neutral, Camilla removes her knee from Ianthe’s chest only long enough to reposition so she sits straddling her torso. She leans forward, bracing herself with one hand by Ianthe’s right ear. “If you want something from me,” she tells the princess, “you’re going to have to ask me for it.”

By now, Ianthe’s twisted shoulder must be screaming, and the stone she is lying on is bitingly cold; she cannot be comfortable. Her fair hair is fanned out around her like a poor imitation of a halo. She tilts her head back to present the perfect column of her throat. Camilla hears her swallow. “Fuck me, Camilla the Sixth.”

It’s a bold request, and she isn’t sure if it was defiance or sheer ego that prompted her to make it, but Cam is experiencing a very intense moment of Not Giving A Fuck, so she decides not to care. She _does_ care about the five hundred kinds of nasty infections they could pick up getting into anything where they are, so the next thing she decides was that a change of scenery is in order. She jumps to her feet and holds out her hand.

Ianthe Tridentarius stares at it.

Camilla rolls her eyes again. “Up.”

She makes the Third necromancer walk in front, not because of some instinctual deference to her rank but because she does not trust her even half as far as she can throw her. The training room is predictably empty at this time of night, but at least it’s reasonably clean and has lights that worked, which cannot be said for the vast majority of Canaan House. She steers Ianthe towards the ancient washroom, outdated though it is. “Wash your hands and face,” she say, and doesn’t wait for a response before turning on one of the squeaking taps and cleaning herself up.

When she looks up again, cold water drips from Ianthe’s chin into the elaborate collar of her shirt. “Are you always this bossy?” the princess asks, quirking a golden eyebrow.

Camilla pins her with her face to the tiled wall at an almost leisurely pace that nevertheless elicits a little gasp of surprise. “Listen, Princess,” she says, stretching so she can let her breath tickle Ianthe’s ear. “You asked me for something, and I am going to give it to you. It happens on my terms or not at all. Understood?”

Ianthe tries to nod. Just above her collar, Camilla can see her carotid artery.

“Thought so.” With her right arm keeping Ianthe pushed against the wall, Camilla runs her left down from her waist over the barely-there curve of her hip and arse and _squeezes_. “Are you going to be good?”

“What if I say no?”

She removes her hand. “I can leave right now.” She notes the hitch in Ianthe’s breath, the tension in her shoulders. “Or—” She leans forward, fitting the length of her body to Ianthe’s, resting the tips of her fingers ever so lightly at the top of her thigh, “— I can keep going.”

She can feel Ianthe inhaling, her body pressed against hers. “I’ll be good.”

Camilla nods, satisfied, shifts her stance, and slips her hand into the waistband of Ianthe’s trousers. For all her bratty back-talk, the Princess of Ida is hot and slick with want. Her fingertips circle the straining bud of her clitoris, in time with Ianthe’s ragged exhale. “Is this what you want, Princess?”

The reply comes as a low groan from the back of her throat. Camilla drops her head onto her shoulder and gently sinks her teeth into the side of Ianthe’s neck. The groan stutters and breaks off. “Use your words.”

“Yes.” She seems surprised how breathless her own voice sounds; she rocks her hips forward into Camilla’s hand, hindered by how little space she has to move between Camilla’s body at her back and the wall at her front. Camilla increases the pressure on her clit, bites her neck again. “Fuck, Sixth.”

And it’s so easy; almost boring. Camilla pushes two fingers inside and Ianthe sobs, her voice echoing from the tiles. She grinds against the heel of Camilla’s hand, bucking against the pressure holding her in place, and when Camilla crooks her fingers and finds that perfect spot, all the tension dissipates from her body and she goes limp in Camilla’s arms. She has to adjust herself to hold Ianthe upright, but no matter. She ignores the heat rising in her own cheeks and pooling between her legs, just focuses all her attention on the noises Ianthe makes, the low moan, the desperate gasps, the needy hiss as she bites her bottom lip and obviously tries to hold something back. Camilla wraps her free arm around her front, finds her nipple through the layers of her clothes, and pinches.

Ianthe jumps as if electrified. “Fuck,” she cries, “I can’t — I need —”

She doesn’t elaborate on what she needs, but she doesn’t have to. Camilla knows her type. She increases her speed, rakes her teeth down the back of Ianthe’s neck, rolls her hips against Ianthe’s arse to show her who’s in charge. The Princess of Ida comes apart like wet flimsy, babbling something incoherent into the tile and giving Camilla her entire weight to support, which is bad form, but Camilla plans to make her make up for it.

When she’s sort of coherent again, Camilla takes Ianthe by the shoulders to turn her around. “What do you say?”

She rolls her eyes, which are still dark and half-lidded in the aftermath, but she pants, “Thank you,” almost like she means it.

“Well done, Princess,” Camilla says and pushes her down to sit on the floor, her back against the wall. With her clean hand she undoes her own trousers and grips Ianthe’s chin, the pad of her thumb resting in the dip of her lower lip. “Now make yourself useful.”

To Ianthe’s credit, she does. She sucks on Camilla’s thumb with obvious enjoyment and hums her approval when Camilla pushes her fingers into her hair and pulls. Her mouth is hot and wet on Camilla’s cunt as she buries her face between her thighs, and Camilla puts her hand against the wall and allows herself this brief moment of relative oblivion. She can’t put reality out of her mind completely; she is too aware, at all times, of who and where she is, of her duty, but the Princess of Ida closes her lips around her clit and sucks on it, teasing her with the tip of her tongue, and fuck, she’s needed this —

“Hand,” she grinds out between her teeth, and Ianthe obligingly offers her fingers for Camilla to clench around, cold and unforgiving, just the way she wants them. Her bandaged arm is throbbing vaguely at the edge of her awareness, a delicious counterpoint to the rising tide of pleasure building at her core. She pulls on Ianthe’s hair again just to hear her yelp, and then she gives herself over to the sensation and rides Ianthe’s face to completion; her orgasm washes over her intermingled with pain and, just a little bit, with guilt.

She stays were she is while she comes back to herself, panting. Ianthe works her through it with something almost like dutiful care until Camilla pushes away from the wall and pulls her trousers back up. “Good girl,” she says, patting Ianthe’s glistening cheek. “Go clean yourself up.”

It’s a diversion tactic. She would not admit to it under torture but she needs a moment to collect herself again, to gather back the threads of her composure into the tightly woven cloth that is Camilla the Sixth, Warden’s Hand. It would be different back home, where she knows whose door to knock on when she needs to wear herself out. This isn’t that different from those quick and gratifying rounds behind the equipment racks — a matter of convenience, of being in the right place at the right time. There is certainly nothing she wants from the Princess of Ida that she hasn’t gotten already, but stress and oxytocin, as she well knows, make one hell of a cocktail.

Finally she turns away to go wash her hands gain and finds Ianthe leaning by the door, arms folded across her chest in an unmistakably smug fashion. “So,” she drawls, her infernal nonchalance apparently restored. “Is this going to be a habit?”

Camilla wipes her hands on her trousers and meets her gaze. “That desperate for it?”

Ianthe snorts and rolls her eyes. “Please. You’re not _that_ special.”

“If you say so.” With a shrug, she adjusts her sword belt and walks past her out of the room without a second glance.

**Author's Note:**

> There are two separate requests for Cam/Ianthe on the kinkmeme, and for some reason I had to write it. Yeah, I don't know either.
> 
> I'm on [twitter](https://darlingofdots.tumblr.com/) and [tumblr](https://twitter.com/darlingofdots)!


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